Willy Reetz was a German painter

Painting

Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...

. Occasionally he is referred to as Wilhelm Reetz, although he signed all his work as 'Willy Reetz'.

Education

Willy Reetz started his career as an apprentice with a church painter. After that he attended the renowned 'Kunstgewerbeschule

Kunstgewerbeschule

A Kunstgewerbeschule was the old name for an advanced school of applied arts in German-speaking countries. The first such schools were opened in Kassel in 1867 and Berlin and Munich in 1868 with other German towns following. They are now merged into universities....

'. After World War I Reetz studied at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf

Kunstakademie Düsseldorf

The Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, formerly Staatliche Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, is the Arts Academy of the city of Düsseldorf. It is well known for having produced many famous artists, such as Joseph Beuys, Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke, Thomas Demand, and Andreas Gursky...

 under Professor Schmurr. From 1920 to 1924 he was a student in the master class of Professor Hans Kohlschein. Study trips to Holland, France and Italy followed.

Themes

Willy Reetz had an extraordinary talent for landscape, figures and portraits. In his early years until World War II he performed mural painting which had a long tradition in Düsseldorf

Düsseldorf

Düsseldorf is the capital city of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and centre of the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region.Düsseldorf is an important international business and financial centre and renowned for its fashion and trade fairs. Located centrally within the European Megalopolis, the...

.
His mastery in this respect was reflected by the creation of several mural paintings in the
Düsseldorf region:
Together with Hans Kohlschein he created the frescos in the church Maria Rosenkranz in Düsseldorf-Wersten. In 1928/29 Reetz won the competition for the execution of murals
in Düsseldorf's Dreifaltigkeitskirche and executed these until summer 1929. Commissions for St. Josef in
Düsseldorf-Oberbilk, for churches in Süchteln, Galkhausen, Elberfeld and Sittard followed.
Reetz also created secular murals in several restaurants and designed glas windows and mosaics.
Unfortunately, almost all of these works were destroyed during World War II.

Another focus of Willy Reetz' activity was the creation of portraits and paintings of landscape. Reetz was a highly estimated member of the "Düsseldorfer Schule", also beyond Düsseldorf. Today, only few of his paintings remain in museums and private collection as his atelier was destroyed during a bombing of Düsseldorf in 1943.

Over 40 years, Willy Reetz was a member of the artists organization "Malkasten" and saved its precious archives during the war. After the war, Willy Reetz became a member of the artists group "Künstlergruppe 1949" and continued his activities in the "Malkasten" thus contributing to its reconstruction.

External links

• Painting at Stadtmuseum Düsseldorf